Horrific photo shows elephant with face hacked off by animal poachers for its ivory tusks

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Christy Cooney

10 Jun 2019, 17:22

Updated: 10 Jun 2019, 17:34

A HORRIFIC photo shows an elephant with its face hacked off by poachers for its ivory tusks.

The image shows an elephant carcass on its knees and soaked in blood as rangers look on.

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This elephant was killed for its ivory, one pound of which can sell for £1,200

The killings of elephants in this way is driven by the price that can be fetched for the ivory on the market.

An international ban on ivory trading was imposed in 1990, but China, from where demand chiefly comes, only outlawed the product itself in 2017.

The ban succeeded in lowering demand, which had already began to fall, it is thought because of slowing growth in the Chinese economy.

But concern continues about the black market in the country, where ivory has traditionally been used for products like piano keys and identity seals as well as traditional medicines.

One pound of ivory can still sell for £1,200, and tusks can weigh up to 250 pounds.

In 2017, two people were convicted for illegal ivory possession in Hong Kong when radiocarbon dating was used to prove the ivory was obtained after the introduction of the international ban 27 years earlier.

A recent study by the University of York found that the portion of elephants dying from poaching had actually declined from 10 per cent in 2011 to 4 per cent in 2017.

Africa has an estimate 350,000 elephants remaining, but researchers say that between 10,000 and 15,000 of the animals are still killed by poachers every year.

In 2014, one of the continent's last 'great tuckers'—elephants with tusks weighing over 100lbs—was poisoned by poaches.

The York study also found that poaching in different areas was related to local levels of corruption and poverty.

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“We are seeing a downturn in poaching, which is obviously positive news, but it is still above what we think is sustainable so the elephant populations are declining,” said Dr Colin Beale, the study's co-author.

“The poaching rates seem to respond primarily to ivory prices in south-east Asia and we can’t hope to succeed without tackling demand in that region.”

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